I was in the 3rd grade when my brother broke the news that he was wanting to join the army.

Auditorium

Throughout the 6 months he was gone, I wrote letters to him as often as possible. This way it was like he was still close to me, writing to him helped me cope with him being gone.

We had a 10 hour drive to the training base in oklahoma. It was a very frustrating ride and my brother was beyond annoying. Everyone was a little wound up since we hadn't seen Zach in so long.

Zachary Joos

The wait for the ceremony seemed like forever, of course, not as long as the car ride. The large auditorium seemed small due to the crowded seats.

The main officer lined all of his men up, and began showing the crowd certain drills they've worked on and showed pictures of the camp during training.

Finally, after a long wait and a lot of names later, my brother was called up to get his basic training degree. I automatically felt great pride overwhelm me after it was official my brother was going to be in the army. I realized what he was doing was great for the country, and to me he was like a hero.